Tuesday, July 31, 2007

I'm deliberately overcompensating for what will likely be an eleven-day drought in ranty-posts.

Yes yes, I know you're thinking:

Whaaaaaaat???? How will I survive eleven days without my fix of blurry house/garden pics with fingernail-measurements, over-puctuated diatribes and wanton, profanity-laced complaining????

But I promise that you will make it through. Especially if you read MNSpeak. (And if you don't, I suggest you do. It's awesome. I've been wasting precious time there for well over a year now, so I know what I'm talking about.)

And nowwwwwwwwwww... to keep you further occupied, how about a contest???

WHERE IN THE WORLD ARE SRA. & SR. RANTY GOING TO BE THIS WEEKEND*?

Okay, here are the hints:

1. It's an island. (But no, not the Greek one from which Sr. Ranty hails.)

2. It's actually a deserted island, located in a tiny archipelago.

3. The main language spoken throughout this archipelago (on the islands which are inhabited, that is to say) is not the same as that of the country to which the island belongs. In fact, the islanders are a source of fascination to some linguistic scholars for their unique patois.

4. This particular deserted island is home to an annual music festival, which takes place next weekend, and is also something of a cult diving destination.

And the biggest hint of all:

5. While I call it an island, the islanders actually call it a "cay." The first person to guess the answer correctly wins a souvenir from the trip! (No, I'm not telling you what the souvenir is, because I don't know yet. It will have to be small and legal to carry across borders though, for sure. :-)

Friday, July 27, 2007

A collection letter! Or, more specifically, a Demand for Payment and Intent to Levy Wages, (um, what wages?) from my buddies over at the Department of Revenue.

Huh? Wha?

Clearly, I thought to myself, this must have something to do with those yahoos losing my tax payment check, which I described back here. The strange part though was that this letter demanded the sum of $249.85... a wholly unfamiliar number to me. (My taxes due last April were over $4k.)

So I called my good friends up over at the collection department to see what had gone awry. They had all been extremely nice to me in the past, and I didn't expect any different this time.

Oops.

The guy who took my call this time must have been working through his designated smoke break or something, because he was rahh-ther snippy. I was, he brusquely informed me, in default on the penalties and interest which had accrued as a result of my failure to pay my tax bill in a timely fashion.

WTF DUDE?

He further explained that while my penalty and interest had technically been abated, I had neglected to send in the necessary proof, in the form of three months worth of bank statements, and that until or unless I did so, I was still in default.

When I began to cry out of sheer anger, his response was something to the effect of "how hard is it to just do what I'm telling you to?"

He obviously didn't understand that the REASON for which I was inching toward hysteria is that the last person I spoke with told me everything was A-OK, and that I was furious with myself for believing her and not sending a confirmation letter via certified mail.

(Needless to say, I am still kicking myself for not sending my first, timely CHECK via certified mail as well.)

So I took the fax number down and bid my dear tax collector adieu, cursing both him and myself all the while.

Five minutes later, my cell phone rang and it was him again.

"Hai! Just wanted to let you know that I checked with my supervisor and she told me that you're all cool, no need to send anything in after all. Sorry 'bout that, we heart you lots, kthnxbai!"

What the...?

I don't know what's wrong with me, but this second conversation was even more upsetting, and made me cry again. Who ARE these fawkers??? Am I just supposed to ignore that letter now? Cuz some dude on the phone told me to? Righttttttttttt.

Now I REALLY have to send them a confirmation letter. UGH.

So depressed was I that I felt compelled to take drastic measures in defense of my mental health:

I dropped everything and went to Goodwill for trampy shoes and gaudy purple stemware.

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

...such as those I'm having right now. Hooray for on-the-job experience, right?

Sigh.

Not 24 hours on the market and we already have issues.

Remember how I had that Truth in Sale of Housing inspection on Monday?

Him: "You passed! No repair/replace orders for you today... that'll be $185 please."

Me: (writing check) "So when do I get that report?"

Him: "Tomorrow morning, probably. I gotta sign off on the old R/Rs and get the new report printed up, but that shouldn't take much. Look for it in your email."

Me: (frowning) "So I guess maybe I can't list my house tomorrow morning then? Y'know, cuz I gotta have that report onsite for showings or risk a big-fat fine..."

Him: (taking my check and giving me a STARE) "You WILL have it tomorrow."

Me: "Okayyyy."

Can you see what's coming here?

No report.

No report?

No report.

NO REPORT???

NO SHOWINGS. PERIOD.

So I hope ya like the photos, cuz that's all anybody's seeing of this place until I get that thing.

And that means no Sunday open house this week. (Wednesday is the deadline for Strib ads.)

*sob*

Here's the problem in a nutshell: I had some plumbing work done, and I did something really effing unusual - I hired a licensed contractor, and I instructed him to pull the appropriate permits for his work. (Whoooo... that's weird, huh?!)

When somebody pulls a permit in the City of Minneapolis, that work must be subsequently inspected. Yeah, you ask? So what?

Yeah, I asked that too.

In FACT, I told the TIH inspector all about that, and he stated many times that he doesn't care about permits. I asked him if I needed to schedule the city inspector PRIOR to his visit and he said NO. Permits, he told me, are NOT HIS GIG. HE DOESN'T CARE. NO PROBLEM, SHUT UP, LEMME COME AND DO MY DAMN INSPECTION... or something to that effect.

Well guess what?

He tried to sign off on the four R/Rs from the old TIH, which he told me were all non-permit-requiring items.

Turns out, he was wrong. The one item which was something about the level of some piece of crap in the guts of the toilet DID need a permit to repair.

Except that I never repaired that.

Um, hello? I gutted the whole damn room and threw that toilet OUT!

(And replaced it with a new one, under permit, with my plumber-guy.)

So nowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww I can't get a city inspector out to check my toilet and other plumbing items until next TUESDAY, after which he must go back downtown, do his blabbity-blah-paperwork, after which the TIH inspector can do his blabbity-blah-paperwork, and THEN... IF he's not too busy on another job he'll email me the report and I can put it onsite and begin to allow showings.

Thursday, July 19, 2007

Yeah, I know. I haven't shown you the front of the house yet. I promise that I will, in the next couple of days.

But for now, how about a blast from the past?

This photo was taken somewhere around 2001, as far as I can tell.

Nasty-awning-ness aside, I can't help but notice that my little housey-house actually HAD A STORM DOOR in this photo.

Whoooooooooooooooooo took it?

Ah well. Whatevah. At least that barf-blue had already been ameliorated by the time I adopted my favorite little orphan-cottage in 2006... and I'm happy to report that the foliage did not actually EAT the house, as one might presume from this picture.

...whatever the particular shade of green, you can bet on it being found at Villa Ranty.

Here are a few on the front porch. Once again, this is not completely staged. I'm going to scrub it up a bit more, add throw pillows to the chairs and a table lamp for good measure.

Sadly, I don't have a before shot of the porch. I screwed up on that. It looked crappy though - take my word for it. I scrubbed, patched, caulked and repainted the entire thing, down to the floorboards. (After scraping the old linoleum and 1930s newsprint off, that is.)

And I guess it's about time I showed you this.(interior view)

(exterior view)

I'm thinking of painting that new-frame wood in the rusty-red color that I have on the porch floor. The reason is that I want to detract from the obnoxiously mis-matched greens of the door and surrounding woodwork.

First of all, it's made of fucking tin foil. The thing was dented inside the box. Later, I think I sneezed, and it dented again... badly.

Second of all, if you look at the product description, there's a line that reads as follows:

Security

Deadbolt with keyed lock is built into the door frame.

WTF, you sneaky bastards! It is NOT built in!

How is this, you ask? I'll tell you how: The door comes flat, with no hardware on it. Not only is there no hardware on it, but you have to actually drill your own holes in the tin foil in order to install THE HANDLE and LOCK.

Third, due to the aforementioned tin foil quality, my door was totally warped. That is to say, when in a closed and locked position, one could still slip a UPS parcel into my porch via the ridiculous gap at the top of this craptastic door's frame.

I tried to bend it back, and almost broke the glass insert. Evidently the components are secured with bubble gum and tape.

Oh, and this door retails for $360 at Home Depot, in case you were wondering.

Friday, July 13, 2007

Guess what came in the mail today? Look at that great note. So professional, eh? (If you can't read it, it says "store credit - per store Mgr. Matt Vernig.")

And for some weird reason they are giving me $107, rather than $100. Perhaps I was $7 bitchier with my last letter...?

This book came today too. I love the title!

Barbara Corcoran, for those of you who don't know, is a real estate guru and master-stager. I believe she's also a correspondent for the Today Show, though I'm not certain since I don't watch TV. (But I have looked at some of her clips on YouTube.)

Now, on to the bedroom. I'm disappointed that I can't find any good before pictures, but I did scare up a couple of bad ones, just to give you a rough idea of what was going on in this room when I started working on the house nearly 8 months ago...

View from the dining room into the bedroom. See how they had some classy curtains hanging in there?

View from the bedroom, looking back out into the dining room. Those double doors were a MESS.

But nowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww:

They're all cleaned up!

This is my favorite-est (Ikea) sconce on the planet.

This is the favorite-est (Ikea) sconce that I busted when I decided to try and let it hang by its wires as I painted around it.

Note: don't do that.

That flower is totally from my garden. :-)

I still need some photography help. I guess I'd better hire a pro for the listing.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

I am writing to follow up on a customer service issue at the Minneapolis Home Depot, about which I contacted your offices last week. (Original letter attached for reference.)

Last Thursday, I hand-delivered my letter to Matt Virnig, and he called me shortly thereafter. While he did apologize for the problems I had encountered as well as offer to send me a $100 gift card, I was disturbed to hear that he had no idea what was going on with my missing storm door. He informed me that he had an employee waiting on hold with the vendor of the product, and that he would call me by the end of the day.

He never called back.

On Friday, July 6, I called the store and was told that Mr. Virnig was not answering his phone. I asked for his voicemail, and the operator told me that he doesn't have any. (How does the manager of an entire store not have voicemail???) I left a message with the operator, asking Mr. Virnig to call me, which he still has not, as of Tuesday, July 10.

This extreme lack of basic customer service is truly mind-boggling, and I do intend to share this story with my friends and industry colleagues so that they may be spared such aggravation by shopping elsewhere.

Friday, July 6, 2007

The problem is increasing in volume and frequency. The culprit MUST BE STOPPED for the health and sanity of the inhabitants of Casa Ranty.

But who could it be????

Undercover investigations of the black cat yielded stinky butt-whiff and a noseful of hair, but nothing in the way of conclusive evidence.

Questioning of the white cat proved equally fruitless, as he repeatedly denied any involvement. (Although he does have a crimminal history, and since his hair was found all over the bed and in the vicinity of the poop, he remains a prime suspect.)

The victim is suffering great psychological stress as a result of these heineous (and repeated) crimes.

About Me

I am a licensed real estate broker with Century 21 Luger Realty, preservationist, fixer-upper-type-nut, sometimes-landlord, and all-around house-addict. I love everything from Queen Annes to Bungalows to Foursquares to Farmhouses.
minneapolisgirlatgmaildotcom is where you can reach me!